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Comment by vincentriemer | Hacker News Reader

Since installing the iOS 13 beta I've noticed a bunch of apps asking for bluetooth access. I haven't kept track of every one but I do remember YouTube and Netflix asking for it on their first launch. Thankfully, I haven't witnessed any app failing to work by denying the request though.

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The Bird (scooter) iPhone app asked me for Bluetooth. It said something about "nearby scooters" which I think is a flat out lie because you unlock them via QR code? Probably also tracking...

Well let’s be realistic, it said nearby scooters. Not “unlock scooters.”

There is the completely valid use case of a scooter that isn’t able to send it’s location to the app yet is close by to you. So it can be found with Bluetooth.

That isn’t to say that the app is isn’t tracking where you go, it doesn’t need the Bluetooth connection to its scooters because you need to turn GPS on to find the scooters.

The app forsure is tracking where you go. There are some areas that are “slow zones” where the scooter won’t go past a certain mph and is throttled. This is done in real time.

COUP scooters (popular in Germany and Spain) use Bluetooth for unlocking it before starting the drive. Not sure what is the reason for that vs. unlocking it through internet connection though.

Faster? More resilient? If they went through the cellular network, there would be more latency, and if the scooter is in a place with poor network coverage, it might not work at all.

(I'm assuming that most phones have better reception than the cheap cellular modems inside scooters)

I've built a scooter app. Bluetooth can help with a few things including closing rides when the user has bad cell coverage.

Ahh actually this makes a lot of sense. The thing is, I don't "pair" the scooter I ride - maybe it's Bluetooth LE?

Actually, I have an android phone around here somewhere loaded up with a BLE inspector app, gonna see if they actually broadcast bluetooth :-p

Youtube and netflix likely do this to discover TVs that you can cast your video to

Then Apple needs to implement an API handler for casting video to TV, instead of letting the app handle it.

It already does? AirPlay / AirDrop .

As far as I'm aware, AirPlay is handled at the OS level so the individual apps don't need permission for peer to peer AirPlay. And of course standard AirPlay is all mDNS for discovery.

For ChromecastI believe it's either SSDP or mDNS, and I don't think they have a P2P casting option IIRC.

The Cast SDK uses Bluetooth so "guests" can cast to your Chromecast.

The one that baffled me the most was the Citi Mobile banking app asking for Bluetooth. Like… what? What possible use is Bluetooth information to a banking app?

Continued: its a rhetorical question of course, there’s only one use and its user tracking.

>Like… what? What possible use is Bluetooth information to a banking app?

"anti fraud"

They’re all listed in Settings > Privacy > Bluetooth, unless uninstalled.

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